The Pleasures of Domesticity
by kittenkhaleesi
Summary: An adventure in parenting the next brood of Lannisters. Parts 1 and 2 up.. still more to come
1. Chapter 1

Edd

The Lions of Casterly Rock were all laying in the warm glow of the setting sun coming through the western windows. The biggest and fattest one was named Ser Jaime, after their late uncle, and he was an orange stripped thing with the tip of his tail missing. As fat and lazy as he was, he was still the hardest to catch. The grey one with the long hair was called Ser Brienne (his sister called her Brie, for short) after the late Brienne of Tarth. She spent most of the day laying in the sun with Ser Jaime or grooming him, like she was almost his mother. She was easy to catch but she would leave large deep cuts on Edd's hands.

The newest addition had arrived with their father from King's Landing, a present for Catie. She was a small black female kitten that Catie was calling Balerion. Which Gerion had said made no sense at all since Balerion was the biggest dragon that ever existed and not a girl. Edd decided he'd try to catch her.

His aunt Arya had said that chasing cats was good practice for fighting. He didn't question her beyond that even though he really wasn't sure why. These were his sister's cats too – and after she had beaten him silly with her slipper earlier that day she kind of deserved this.

Edd had left his shoes out in the hallway and snuck in quietly. He saw Ser Jaime's ear twitch and he paused. _He knows I'm here… he hears me._

Baby Balerion was curled up in the windowsill with her face tucked under one teensy paw. Slowly Edd crept closer and stopped as Ser Jaime turned and looked right at him with green slitted eyes. Then slowly Ser Brienne moved her head and stared at him too. Balerion did not move.

Edd relaxed a little as the two older cats just got up and walked out of the room abandoning the smallest and newest of them to Edd's evil catnapping plan. _I won't hurt Catie's precious baby… but I will make her worry a little bit about it._

Balerion just purred and stretched out one arm as Edd picked her up and moved her into his bedroom. He dropped her into a pile of clothes he was supposed to be packing in trunks for the journey to Winterfell. She did not even wake up.

Edd snuck off to the kitchens to get a snack while waiting for the chaos to start. Little Rob had already beat him there. The kitchen was in a big fuss since their father had returned home and were preparing a big dinner, so nobody noticed when they stole away some lemon cakes and sat in the garden to eat them.

"You stole the kitten?" Rob was only five and an easy accomplice. He and Edd had the same taste for mischief. "Catie is going to have a fit… we're going to get whacked again!"

"She won't whack us with Father and Mother watching… " Edd realized this wasn't entirely true.

Rob kicked his legs as he shoved another lemon cake in his mouth as the shrill scream of their oldest sister echoed from inside. Edd was trying hard to keep a straight face – his mother once told him he had too honest of a face, just like the grandfather he was named for.

By dinner Catie was nearly inconsolable, Edd watched her sitting across from him barely nibbling at her plate. Her light blue-green eyes were like pools of worry and seemed to tear up everytime someone even coughed. Edd knew the jig would be up as soon as the whole family got into the room, his father read people too easily. Especially his own children.

"Rob, you look like you would like to say something." Tyrion asked his second youngest. Rob just stared wide-eyed at his mother, like he knew he was about to get into trouble. _What an idiot! He's giving everything away!_

Sansa didn't say anything, just stared back at Rob.

"I DIDN"T DO ANYTHING IT WAS ALL EDD! He took it! I didn't do nothing!" Rob blurted out, yelling across the table.

"He's lying I don't know anything about the damn kitten!" Edd shouted across the table at Rob. His mother was staring hard at him, he knew his honest face was giving him away.

Catie was radiating fury. Sansa spoke calmly, "Eddard Lannister – if you would please return your sister's kitten your whole family would be grateful for it."

"You should listen to your mother, she's a wise woman. You wouldn't want your beloved sister's wrath to fall upon you." His father spoke as if he knew from a great deal of experience. Edd knew that his late Uncle Jaime had a twin, a sister, and that once she had been queen. But neither his father, nor his mother, cared to speak much about her. He didn't even know her name.

"I told you I don't know anything about it! Rob must have done it and he's blaming it on me!" Edd insisted. He looked at Catie again, her eyes had turned from watery pools to circles of green fire. He knew he was going to pay for this.

"Gerion! You saw me earlier… tell them I didn't do anything." He turned to look at his older brother Gerion. Gerion was only two years older than Edd, but he was quiet and more interested in books and studying. Mother said he would probably end up a Maester someday.

"I saw you this morning… who knows what you were doing this afternoon." Gerion took another bite of his food. His head was elsewhere as always.

It was the end of the straw for his older sister, she picked up her gold goblet of water and threw it across the table right in Eddard's face. He picked up the nearest thing to him, a piece of onion pie and flung it at her. She didn't even flinch as it hit her shoulder and soiled the dress she was wearing. Rob began yelling too, encouraging the fight to happen. Sansa just moved to stand up, narrowly avoiding a thrown chicken wing. She picked up baby Joanna and looked at her husband.

"They are your children." She said to him, though it was not without a small amount of mirth.

"Yes, yes." Tyrion said before slamming his heavy empty goblet onto the table. The children were surprised and all stared at him. They had varying amounts of food and other detritus stuck to their clothing and varying shades of red-gold hair. "No matter how humorous this is for me to watch – you are upsetting your mother and I won't have it."

"Sorry, Mother." Came a unison of contrite voices, Edd's among them. He did not like to upset his mother. Father had said she had many upsets in her life and he didn't want to contribute to that.

"You will all have baths before bed." Rob and Edd groaned as their mother said this. Sansa shifted the baby onto her other hip. Her hand was resting on the back of their father's chair, "And you will all get your trunks packed before mid-morning tomorrow – neatly. With everything… folded."

Rob gasped.

"I can't pack ahead of time. I can't decide what things I want to take until the last minute!" Catie exclaimed.

"You will listen to your mother. You've backed yourself into a rather steep corner with your antics this evening, children." Tyrion was still trying his bed to not seem too amused. He knew it would upset Sansa if he encouraged their children to be wild and ornery when he was away so often. He was terribly indulgent.

At the end of the day, it was Ser Jaime the cat who allowed Catie to rescue Balerion from Edd's room. Edd heard from Rob that while he was bathing, Ser Jaime led Catie straight to Edd's bedroom door and howled at it until under the crack between the door and the floor a tiny black paw swiped out.

Rob came back to Edd's room later in the night, sniffling and crying.

"Are you really being such a big baby? What is the matter now?"

"Mother's door is closed."

"Of course it is you idiot. It's always closed and locked when Father is here."

"But Gerion left the hall. He said he saw ghosts."

To be continued..(?)


	2. Chapter 2

Gerion

Gerion had often been called the most sensitive of Tyrion Lannister's children. He was soft-spoken, somewhat meek, and much preferred the company of books and dusty tomes of knowledge to those of other children or even adults. He was tall and thin, with no interest in fighting or other more "manly" pursuits.

At twelve years old, Gerion was considered very accomplished. He had decided that once he was more of age he wanted to journey to Oldtown and forge his chain. But for now Gerion was stuck here at Casterly Rock, with his brothers and sisters, chasing ghosts in the hallways.

He saw her frequently – a ghostly shape of a woman with long hair, walking down the hallway. He would follow her, follow her all the way down, through the great rooms of Casterly Rock and into the Hall of Heroes where she could go and stand in front of one particular statue - in front of one particular set of remains.

He was following her again. He wasn't sure what she was trying to tell him but he felt bad for her. He felt her and she felt so sad. He always kept about twenty paces behind her, following the wispy form down the stairs and through the rooms, his bare feet on the stones.

He reached the Hall of Heroes and saw her standing in front of the statues. As soon as he moved into the Hall though, she disappeared. _She's trying to tell me something…_

"That… that…"

Gerion whipped around and saw his older sister standing there, clutching her long nightgown. Catie was staring with her eyes huge and her mouth open.

"That was a ghost!" she finally blurted out.

"You saw it too?" Gerion was surprised, up until this point he was certain he was the only one that saw her.

"I did… just for a moment.. I saw her dress." Catie started to look scared.

"It's allright – she's been here for a while." Gerion walked over and looked up at the statue she had stopped in front of. It was a statue of their late Uncle Jaime – the golden statue that stood over where he had been interred.

"Who was it?" Catie shivered some seeming quite bothered by it.

"I have my theories."

Suddenly there was loud noise as something metal got knocked over nearby and Catie screamed an impressive earsplitting scream. Ser Jaime the cat approached them at a trot, rubbing against Catie's legs.

"Ser Jaime!" she called out exasperatedly, leaning down and picking him up.

"What in the name of all the gods is going on down here?" Tyrion was panting, having heard Catie scream lured him from his bedroom where he was keeping his usual late nights. He had hurried as fast as his stunted legs could take him down to where he had heard the commotion. Worry was evident on his face as he stared at his two oldest children. Catie's long red-gold hair was rumpled and loose down her back. She was in her nightgown and Gerion was in his long nightshirt, looking less wild.

"Father there was a ghost!" Catie ran over to him, holding her cat. "And then Ser Jaime knocked something over and… it scared me. I honestly thought I might die."

"Ghost?" Tyrion seemed immediately uneasy, looking at where Gerion had been standing. "Both of you go back to bed now. We are going to be on the road for quite some time and your mother will have a fit if she knows you are both up so late."

"But Father… I'm scared." Catie whimpered.

"There isn't any reason to fear the dead." Gerion said quietly as he moved away from the statue and walked towards where his father was standing. Catie was already heading back up the stairs ahead of them.

"If your mother had been awake I'm sure she would have had died of the fright." Tyrion spoke to his oldest son as he waddled up the stairs. Gerion slowed his pace considerably.

"It was my dead aunt." Gerion stated bluntly. "If you would just accept her bones back into the Rock and lay her with her brother she could rest peacefully."

"Cersei will never rest peacefully." Tyrion stated coldly. "And that's all I want to hear on the matter. She was laid to rest next to her long dead husband and that is where she should stay."

The next few days were filled with packing and readying for the month and a half long trip to Winterfell. Gerion packed plenty of books, paper, and ink to keep him occupied. He had already decided he would ride most of the way, just to stave off boredom for the most part, and because the last thing he wanted to do was half to ride in a carriage with Edd and Rob, who no doubtedly would be making up piss and shit jokes the whole way.

Catie started out on horseback as well, though he knew his sister would soon tire and get into a carriage to sleep for most of the journey. She reined her gray mare closer to him, speaking quietly.

"Your theory about the ghost - what is it?"

"That some people that are born into this world together, won't rest until leave together."


End file.
